Pros & Cons
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- Prints, scans, copies, and faxes
- Low ink cost
- Ample paper capacity for a busy small office
- Automatic duplex printing
- ADF with manual duplex scanning
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- Expensive
- Slow compared with cartridge-based competition
Canon Maxify GX4020 Specs
| Automatic Document Feeder | |
| Color or Monochrome | Color |
| Connection Type | Ethernet |
| Connection Type | USB |
| Connection Type | Wi-Fi |
| Connection Type | Wi-Fi Direct |
| Cost Per Page (Color) | 0.85 cents |
| Cost Per Page (Monochrome) | 0.14 cents |
| Maximum Scan Area | Legal |
| Maximum Standard Paper Size | Legal |
| Monthly Duty Cycle (Maximum) | 33,000 pages per month |
| Monthly Duty Cycle (Recommended) | Not rated |
| Number of Ink Cartridges/Tanks | 4 |
| Number of Ink Colors | 4 |
| Print Duplexing | |
| Printer Input Capacity | 250 + 100 + 1 |
| Printing Technology | Inkjet |
| Rated Speed at Default Settings (Color) | 13 ppm |
| Rated Speed at Default Settings (Mono) | 18 ppm |
| Scanner Optical Resolution | 1,200 by 1,200 pixels per inch |
| Scanner Type | Flatbed with 35-page ADF |
| Standalone Copier and Fax | Copier |
| Standalone Copier and Fax | Fax |
| Type | All-in-one |
The Canon Maxify GX4020 all-in-one (AIO) offers most of the same print specs as the Canon GX3020, but thanks to its added automatic document feeder (ADF), fax support, and an Ethernet connection, it's a qualitatively different beast. Where the GX3020 is suitable for the range from family to home office to a small office with only limited scan and copy needs, the GX4020's natural home is a busy micro office or small office that needs both heavy-duty printing and moderate-duty scanning, copying, and faxing. Directly competitive with the Epson ST-C4100, it outdoes the Epson printer's paper handling by enough to replace it as our new Editors' Choice pick for a tank-based inkjet AIO for a busy small office.
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The GX4020 pairs the low running cost of a tank printer with both paper-handling flexibility and a reasonably high paper capacity. In addition to a 250-sheet front drawer and a 100-sheet tray at the top rear of the printer (which makes it easy to add or switch paper types), there's a single-sheet tray with a straight-through path for heavy weight paper in the back. The 350-sheet capacity is enough to print up to 1,400 sheets per month, and even more printed pages thanks to automatic duplexing, while still keeping paper refills down to about once a week.
For scanning, copying, and faxing, there's a both a letter-size flatbed and an ADF that can hold up to 35 letter-size or five legal-size pages. The ADF doesn't offer automatic duplexing, but it will let you scan one side of duplex pages, wait for you to flip the stack over, then scan the second side and automatically interfile the scanned pages in the right order. Combined with the automatic print duplexing, the feature lets you copy either one- or two-sided originals to one- or two-sided copies.
At 20.9 pounds and 9.9 by 15.8 by 16.4 inches (HWD), the GX4020 is easy for one person to move into place and compact enough to share a desk with, so you can easily reach the 2.7-inch color touch-screen control panel and physical buttons. Once in place, all that's left for physical setup is to load paper and pour in the ink—cyan, yellow, magenta, and black. As is typical, the bottles are keyed to ensure that each color goes into the right tank. After you finish, the printer goes through a completely automated alignment routine.
Software installation is typical as well, requiring downloading a setup program from Canon's website. For my tests, I connected the GX4020 to the testbed network via Ethernet, then let the program automatically find the printer and set up the print driver and scan utility. You can also download Canon's apps for both Android and iOS devices for mobile printing and scanning. As with other Canon models we've tested, there's even an option to show a QR code on the printer's LCD for easy connection. In my tests using an Android phone and Wi-Fi Direct, the printing, scanning, and QR code all worked as promised.
As already mentioned, the GX4020 delivers a low running cost to offset its high initial price. Canon's website says the ink that comes with the printer is enough to print 5,000 standard black-and-white pages plus 5,000 color pages, and that each set of replacement bottles will print 6,000 black-and-white pages plus 14,000 color pages, which works out to a cost of 0.14 cent per mono page and 0.85 cent per color page. As always, don't get too carried away with the low cost per page when you compare the GX4020 with the competition. The numbers that really matter are for the total cost of ownership—running cost plus initial cost—as we discuss in our guide to how to save money on your next printer.
Testing the Canon Maxify GX4020: Commendable Speed and Output Quality
As expected for a tank-based printer, the GX4020's performance on our tests was slower than comparable cartridge-ink-based competition that costs less, including the Epson WF-4830, for example. However, it was a match for tank-based competition, and remember, you're paying extra money up front for the cheap running cost.
In my tests, connecting both our standard testbed and the GX4020 to the network via Ethernet, the GX4020 printed pages 2 through 12 of our 12-page Microsoft Word text file at 16.9ppm (39 seconds total)—just a touch off its 18ppm rating. Adding the first page to the calculation dropped the speed to 14.1ppm (51 seconds total). The WF-4830 was significantly faster, at 27.5ppm (24 seconds total) for pages 2 through 12 and 19.5ppm (37 seconds total) for the full file. However, both had essentially the same first page out (FPO) time, which means you won't see a noticeable difference between the two for printing text files up to about two or three pages. Both the GX3020 and Epson ST-C4100 were essentially tied with the GX4020 and each other.
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On our business applications suite, which includes several files ranging from one to four pages, and includes graphics and color in most, the WF-4830 was also the fastest by far, at 2 minutes and 8 seconds (2:08, or 12ppm). The ST-4100 was the fastest among the three tank printers, at 3:21 (7.5ppm), largely thanks to its fast FPO time. The GX4020 and GX3020 essentially tied for last place, separated by no more than a rounding error, at 3:41 and 3:40 (6.8ppm in both cases), and the GX4020 was only 20 seconds behind the ST-4100 for the full suite.
Text quality was just a tad below top tier for business inkjets. Characters didn't have quite as sharp edges as you would expect from a laser printer, but all but one of the fonts in our tests that are likely to be used in standard business documents were well-formed, properly spaced, and highly readable at 5 points. Even the one that showed some slight gaps in narrowed areas of what should be solid lines was easily readable. Most were also readable and well-formed at 4 points.
The loss of crispness compared with laser output was most obvious in the two heavily stylized fonts in our tests with heavy strokes. Spaces between characters, as well as loops, tended to fill in, making sizes smaller than 10-point text for one font and 8-point text for the other hard to read.
Graphics on plain paper with default settings offered nicely saturated color and good gradients, and also maintained thin lines, including a single-pixel-wide line on a black background. However, I saw banding in all but the lightest shades of solid fills, which varied from subtle for lighter shades to obvious in darker shades. Photos on the recommended photo paper were at the high end of drugstore quality.
On our water smudging tests, which consist of putting a few drops of water on output printed at least 24 hours earlier and gently wiping it dry, black text on plain paper smudged only slightly, and color ink didn't smudge at all. I saw no smudging on the recommended photo paper or when using a highlighter for text on plain paper. Note that I saw slightly greater smudging with the GX3020's output on the same tests, despite both printers using the same ink. That suggests that the ink may continue to increase its water fastness beyond the 24-hour minimum time we wait before running the test.
Verdict: Everything a Busy Small Office Needs
The GX4020 is our top pick for its category, but all the AIOs mentioned here are potentially good choices for the right office. The WF-4830 delivers both the fastest performance in this group and the highest paper capacity. If you won't be printing enough pages over its lifetime for the high ink cost to make its total cost of ownership much higher than for a tank-based printer, or if you want the speed and paper handling regardless of running cost, you'll want to consider it.
If you've decided a tank printer is the way to go, but don't need faxing or Ethernet connectivity, and won't be scanning and copying enough to need an ADF, the GX3020 may be just the right fit at a lower price. Similarly, if you need even one of those three features, but don't mind a single paper drawer for printing and don't need the option to scan in duplex, even manually, the ST-C4100 is worth considering for its slightly faster print speeds.
That said, the GX4020 offers essentially the same print capability as the GX3020 with Ethernet, faxing, and an ADF added. Plus, it offers better paper handling than the ST-C4100 does for printing and scanning at only a slightly slower speed. This combination makes it an easy pick as our new Editors' Choice-award-winning small office inkjet AIO for heavy-duty printing and moderate-duty scanning.